You see a wide road cutting across the woods on a bright day and soon, a beautiful beast on four wheels zooms past, gliding oh so gracefully, showing off its curves and dodging the rocks effortlessly. All this on your TV screen, in between the movie break. And you wouldn’t deny that it is a visual treat, would you?

Advertising is a big business, and so is creating the ads. Almost every ad now consists of fantastical landscapes, exotic creatures and vivid sceneries- all made possible with the aid of VFX, animatics and motion capture.

MPC Advertising is a leading player in this industry. MPC Advertising – Bengaluru general manager Sal Umerji talks more about the functioning and talent acquisition at the MPC Advertising facility in Bengaluru.

In addition to creating commercials for the biggest brands in the world, we also create promotional videos for the hottest musical talent, including The Rolling Stones, Adele, Arcade Fire and Stevie Wonder.

2. Who all are in the core team? What is their work experience?

The core team is made up of a number of people including the creative director, supervisors and individual discipline leads, some of whom have international experience and some started as juniors, progressing up the career ladder at MPC Advertising.

Having a global client base means that we work on international campaigns, which encompasses the Indian market.

5. What is the kind of technology used?

Our teams use the industry-standard Maya for 3D and Nuke for 2D work. We also utilise a variety of additional proprietary tools and software, which enable us to deliver world-class VFX for the advertising industry. By mirroring our pipeline with our other global sites, we can create a superior workflow that allows for any project to be worked on in any site without delay.

A still from Samsung’s Ostrich campaign for Samsung’s VR Headset

6. What is the work/office culture?

We think it’s important to place creativity and collaboration at the heart of our office culture. One way we do this is through regular meetings as a team to review each other’s work and provide feedback. It’s also important for us to provide a working environment that creates a balance between work and play – we often take our team on office outings and offer employee engagement programs. We’ve also recently added a recreation room in Bangalore, allowing artists to take time out and recharge.

7. What qualities do you look for in the employees before hiring?

Along with creative skills and communication, we look for artists with a passion for the industry who are looking to learn and grow within the company. As we deal with a huge range of projects in our global studios, we are always on the lookout for outstanding talent who can offer exciting new approaches, versatility and a high level of initiative and versatility to their work.

8. What kind of training do you impart to the new employees?

We offer various training programs for the artists across technical and soft skills. New employees have two weeks of training, which includes various production and creative inductions before they start work on a show. We also provide various cross training programs for artists to further their skills and grow within the department towards more complex disciplines.

A still from MPC Advertising’s work for Heineken’s commercial ‘The Trailblazers’

On top of this, we are also committed to investing in our management team by providing necessary training to our employees to be good leaders, with some of these sessions being carried out by international trainers.

9. What are the growth opportunities at MPC Advertising?

With our Bangalore studio in the process of expansion, there are various growth opportunities within the company across all disciplines. We encourage artists to choose the area that they wish to grow in and learn in and we support and nurture them along the journey.

10. Why do employees like working at MPC Advertising?

We value personal time, so we encourage staff to arrive and leave on time, we also try to avoid weekend work where possible. We regularly run artist engagement programs to keep the crew engaged. Investing in the career growth of the artists is also important, so we offer training programs to further their skills and help them learn other disciplines. We also make a concerted effort to recognise achievements and reward them accordingly to value each and every artist.

A still from John Lewis’s Christmas Advert – 2016 campaign #BusterTheBoxer